Is it really that bad?

No it's not... Deus Ex wasn't even open world, and Witcher 3 is not even in the same ballpark as MEA, from the far superior tech to the writing. Talk about hyperbole.

...and of course there are many parallels to that other Frostbyte game by BW, one has to be blind to not see them.

What part of semi open-world you miserably failed to understand? I'm not even talking about writing or whatnot. Read again you silly.

And tbh this is no longer Mass Effect to me, its something else entirely at this point. And its no longer something i find myself liking either. This will be a wait till its cheap buy for me. Im still gonna play at somepoint though, as large scale science fiction rpgs are not exactly in abundance but i wont be rushing out to buy it. I just have to admit that these games are not for me or my tastes anymore. Im not the audience Bioware/EA are aiming for and want with Mass Effect Andromeda.

Sure, but the MEA characters aren't even animated well enough to DO a bite...

I will play the free trial over the weekend to make my opinion, but from what I've read so far it seems this is a rush job with meh story and bad user interfaces that I've come to hate from Bioware. I will probably cancel my pre-order of the Deluxe edition and wait for it to hit the bargain bin.

I'm sorry but I do not pay for half baked goods and companies that don't learn and improve on flaws of past games.

I have exactly the same feeling... while I did buy it, it will be my last RPG from BW, if that's the new standard. DAI had problems too, but it still was by and large a solid RPG, MEA is... something else. As much of what Hollywood cranks out these days, this game is a heartless and brainless mass product. Ridley Scott to Micheal Bay, if you will.

I played 5 hours. The start, prologue planet, initial talkyness (I'm trying to stay away from anything remotely spoilery). I didn't start the Tempest and the bigger planet part of the trial, but I feel pretty confident I nearly completely covered everything you could do before that.

No, its not that bad.

But it nearly proves to me that I won't consider the game a 10/10. But I'm not sure if I'd even give any previous ME game a 10/10. Maybe ME2? Sorta? Bioware games never scream perfection to me, yet still get to be on my favorites list.

Of the content I did so far, it was at least a 7/10. So it was good, but not the most compelling.

There's the potential for the full game to be at least a 8/10, and that's with all warts considered.

I hope it gets that potential, but also more that really rocks my world, so I can consider it around a 9/10 and just have a blast overall.

The CC is disappointing and I want a fix and expansion to it.
The animation is in a bizarre state of sometimes better than ever, while often stuck in the past or downright gross. I'm close to insisting on a major patch that focuses just on this. It'd help the state of the game in the long run (mixed with DLC, in a collection-pack version).
The writing is... good but bad but intriguing but spotty? I could use so many words, good and bad, to describe it so far. There is potential for something I'll really love (even if I end up yawning at the structure of main plot), or it could be the most boring filler of a Bioware game in a series, ever. Characters may end up being the most generally endearing (or fascinating, etc) in a single BW game ever or in a long time, or they could be a sad attempt at doing a full-game version of Citadel DLC fanservice.

There's too much unknown, so I can just tell you, its almost certainly not what I'd ever call a 6/10 and I am very sure that I won't call it a 10/10. It'll be good to great. How great will depend on how much faults get minimized/fixed over playtime/patches, and it'll depend in how the journey progresses and ends. There's plenty of nice things to see here.


Oh and something came to mind - I like the scanner so far, and all the NPCs everywhere, and just the sense of 'place' that is happening. It may not be employed the best, but its there and it feels much expanded on from the trilogy. It makes me lament the idea of the Milky Way treatment never getting this sort of expansion.